Facebook Loosens Rules to Let Teens Publicly Share Posts

Facebook Inc. (FB) is loosening rules to
let teens share their content publicly, as the world’s largest
social-networking service looks to woo younger members and stave
off competition.

While users aged 13 to 17 previously could only share posts
as widely as “friends of friends,” they now can make a message
or photo available to anyone on the service or across the Web,
the company said in a post yesterday. At the same time, Facebook
will make “friends” the first option for teens sharing items
when they join the site, more restrictive than the previous
“friends of friends” preset alternative.

Facebook is seeking to keep younger users engaged on the
service as it faces competition for the attention of teens, who
are often early adopters of new social-media technologies and
have spurred the rise of startups including Snapchat, which lets
messages or photos that are sent disappear quickly. Facebook
last year bought mobile photo-sharing service Instagram, which
had become popular with teens.

“Teens are among the savviest people using social media,
and whether it comes to civic engagement, activism, or their
thoughts on a new movie, they want to be heard,” Facebook said
on its site. “While only a small fraction of teens using
Facebook might choose to post publicly, this update now gives
them the choice to share more broadly, just like on other
social-media services.”

Privacy Firestorm

The changes come amid rising concerns over safety and
privacy for children when they interact online. Privacy groups
have criticized proposed policy updates at Facebook that said
minors would need to verify that a parent or guardian consented
to their data being part of promotions.

Other Internet services are also courting younger users.
Twitter Inc., which lets users post short messages, lets teens
share broadly on its service, along with Google’s own social
feature, Google+. Other sites to open up to teens include
LinkedIn Corp. (LNKD), a service focused on business users. In August,
LinkedIn said users as young as 13 could join in some countries,
though it restricted how widely some items -- including birth
dates and profile photos -- can be shared.

As part of the Facebook changes, teens can select an option
to let others “follow” them, the company said. This feature,
similar to Twitter’s, lets followers easily see posts that are
made public.

Facebook said it will add extra steps that tell teens that
public posts can be seen by anyone if they select the option.

“We take the safety of teens very seriously, so they will
see an extra reminder before they can share publicly,” the
company said.

Facebook has made other efforts around online safety.
Earlier this year, the Menlo Park, California-based company
partnered with the National Association of Attorneys General to
start a consumer-education program to provide teens and parents
with help on how to manage their “privacy and visibility, both
on Facebook and more broadly on the Internet.”